No, you just repeated what you said in your first few posts. I said you were exaggerating so I expected you to either back up your statements or adjust your stance. You did neither, you just repeated your original statement._________________attitude of a street punk, only cutting selected words out of context to get onself excuse to let one's dirty mouth loose

No, you just repeated what you said in your first few posts. I said you were exaggerating so I expected you to either back up your statements or adjust your stance. You did neither, you just repeated your original statement.

Clarification in the intent of clearing up a disagreement shouldn't be labeled 'just repeating.' Is this part of your whole judgment that all I'm doing is saying 'lol no?'

I'm just asking for some nuance, Sam. You're talking about the Roma as a single entity, while Sam the Eagle differentiates between those who've settled in the area and those still travelling around. You talk about Europe as a whole, while the main problem is in countries like Italy, Germany, France, etc. This is probably because these countries have larger amounts of Roma within their borders. You also say Roma face more persecution in Europe than the rest of the world and while true, it's a pretty useless statement, seeing as Europe probably has more Roma than most other continents.

This may seem like nitpicking, but if we are going to talk about this problem (including generalisations and discrimination), it really isn't a luxury to be precise.

That said, Thy is a horrible person and you should ignore him if possible._________________attitude of a street punk, only cutting selected words out of context to get onself excuse to let one's dirty mouth loose

willem - i don't know about sam, but you've told me a whole lot more about the roma than i knew, in that last post alone.

there aren't a lot of really truly gypsies in the u.s.; there are assorted people who have been called 'gypsies' - basically anyone who travels around picking up a living however they can, which can cover bums and migrant workers and all sorts of people who share nothing more than a general life style.

much of this discussion reminds me of stuff going on in the u.s. about illegal immigrants (which for most of the vocal discussion really means 'mexicans') - except that mexicans really don't beg, they pretty much come here to work. which leads me to wonder, especially given what someone said in this thread about roma being the laborers in romania, whether what appears to be the perception of roma being beggars and thieves and the like is actually true, or similar to people in the u.s. figuring all mexicans are actually involved in the drug trade or are really here as welfare frauds. mexicans can often be distinguished by appearance (brown skin/black hair) and accents/use of spanish - at least, it's the perception that they are easy to pick out - are roma? if so, does that impact their ability to get jobs?_________________aka: neverscared!

I'm just asking for some nuance, Sam. You're talking about the Roma as a single entity,

Asking for nuance is different, and better. I'm happy to clarify my position, what little there is (mainly, I'm just saying, literally, i don't know, what do you guys think). I don't mean to talk about the Roma as a single entity at all, and I've really had no disagreements with anything you've brought to the table about the issue at all. I even grant and posit that a large part of the problem — per the discrimination — is that it's impossible that the entirety of the culture is the Worst Case Scenario camps I initially talked about, but the grifters from that are what people are going to most often remember in terms of perpetuating Thy-style blatant anti-Roma bigotry.

Really, if you look through the thread, I'm mainly here to ask people to help me understand more of the situation.

Quote:

You talk about Europe as a whole, while the main problem is in countries like Italy, Germany, France, etc. This is probably because these countries have larger amounts of Roma within their borders

Same thing happens with the muslim subcommunities, or off over here, anti-hispanic bigotry in the areas with heaviest immigration in the US. It does all seem to follow NIMBY reactionism.

Honestly though, I don't know too much about Roma myself. They just don't appear in the media here and just aren't seen as an issue. The last time they were mentioned, it probably only appeared in the national media because of the storm over in France.

Aside from that... yeah, not much. There was a bit to do about some Roma that had occupied a derelict building or something in Ghent. I think that didn't even make the national news, just some local papers. And it was mainly about how terrible it was that these people had to live in what was basically a dump and a dangerous one at that.

What I'd be interested in knowing is if the situation the Roma are in can be compared to the fate of other migrating/vagrant/whatever groups in other parts of the world._________________attitude of a street punk, only cutting selected words out of context to get onself excuse to let one's dirty mouth loose

A large part of why you likely hear so little about the Roma, Willem, is because there is not a significant population of them near you. This is also likely why you do not perceive racism toward them as an issue (racism being most pronounced when two segregated populations are close in proximity. See Paris, outskirts of and South, Deep.)

That's why the graphic here is so damned awesome. It shows both the size of the Roma (Romani) population as a raw number and as a percentage of a country's overall population. Places with large populations and especially places where a significant percent of the population is Romani have serious issues.

You northern types, not so much._________________Scire aliquid laus est, pudor est non discere velle
"It is laudable to know something, it is disgraceful to not want to learn"
~Seneca

I'm just asking for some nuance, Sam. You're talking about the Roma as a single entity,

Asking for nuance is different, and better. I'm happy to clarify my position, what little there is (mainly, I'm just saying, literally, i don't know, what do you guys think). I don't mean to talk about the Roma as a single entity at all, and I've really had no disagreements with anything you've brought to the table about the issue at all. I even grant and posit that a large part of the problem — per the discrimination — is that it's impossible that the entirety of the culture is the Worst Case Scenario camps I initially talked about, but the grifters from that are what people are going to most often remember in terms of perpetuating Thy-style blatant anti-Roma bigotry.

Really, if you look through the thread, I'm mainly here to ask people to help me understand more of the situation.

Quote:

You talk about Europe as a whole, while the main problem is in countries like Italy, Germany, France, etc. This is probably because these countries have larger amounts of Roma within their borders

Same thing happens with the muslim subcommunities, or off over here, anti-hispanic bigotry in the areas with heaviest immigration in the US. It does all seem to follow NIMBY reactionism.

Romanian lawmaker Alin Popoviciu is blaming fear for the failure of a bill he sponsored that would have imposed new regulations and taxes on witches and fortune tellers. He claimed that the legislation had failed because lawmakers were afraid they would be cursed if they passed it.

The bill, drafted by Popoviciu and his colleague Cristi Dugulescu, was designed to help increase tax revenue by tightening regulations on witches and fortune tellers, who are apparently among the many groups dodging taxes in Romania. The country's economy has been hit hard by the recession, which could be seen as good news since it at least proves Romania actually has an economy in the first place. But the government's crypts seem to be running short on gold or whatever they use for money there, and in an effort to increase revenue it has increased sales taxes and cut public-sector wages by 25 percent.

The witch bill would have cracked down on the industry by requiring witches and fortune tellers to keep and produce receipts (somehow "receipt" is not a word I've ever associated with witches), and would also have provided that fortune tellers could be held liable for getting predictions wrong. (Insert your own joke about whether they saw this coming.)

Maria Campina, described as a "well-known Romanian witch," conceded Thursday that it was difficult to tax her kind because their revenues were "erratic." But she also insisted that they should be tax-exempt. "Why should we pay taxes when we don't get anything from the state?" said Campina, who apparently conjures up her own roads and utilities. She really appeared to be arguing that witches contribute more to the economy than people recognize. "We already do a lot for our country," she said. "Whenever there's an important Christian celebration, we perform a ritual to protect the country from natural disasters -- that has to be worth more than any tax income." It wasn't clear from this report whether she was claiming they protected Christians during their celebrations or protected the rest of the country from the Christians.

According to one report, in 2002 Campina said that in retaliation for a new law that banned promotion of sorcery in the media, she had ordered all Romanian witches to use their magic to prevent Romania from joining NATO or the European Union. NATO and the EU apparently have more powerful sorcerers, because Romania has since joined both.

It was not clear whether the two lawmakers would try to revise the bill and re-introduce it, if they are still able to write with tiny little webbed paws.

_________________“Yields falsehood when preceded by its quotation”
yields falsehood when preceded by its quotation.